November 22, 2018
"Did a president of the United States, while in command of total nuclear war, detach himself enough from its power to give his life for peace?" — James W. Douglass, JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters.
We imagined everything differently
Before our generation's leader was killed.
We read Albert Camus, our bible,
And vowed to be neither executioner nor victim.
We wanted to be rebels, in our fashion,
But ended up consumers in their niches.
We witnessed the Empire's revenge
When bullets took down our peers at Kent State.
We stumbled into our adult lives in the Seventies
While the spirit of Nixon settled over America.
We protested when his agents devastated Vietnam,
Now we howl as Agent Orange deconstructs the presidency.
We tried to make a difference
As the Armies of the Night
We buried our hopes with our heroes
As the colors faded after 1968.
Editor's note: Although he did not film the home movie streaming above, the 13-year-old who now edits this journal will never forget being in the crowd at that place on that day to cheer the future President.
George Salamon has the opposite view of the 1960s from those expressed by the Wall Street Journal's editorial writers. He lives and writes in St. Louis, MO.